FROM THE PUBLISHER

Historic photos and a lively text chronicle dramatic events from the time of wagon trains to the arrival of airplanes. Bryan drew most of these tales, many published here for the first time in book form, from the pages of early newspapers and from the accounts of New Mexico old-timers whom Bryan interviewed in the 1950s and 1960s. Last Vegas, New Mexico, is the focal point of this narrative of a town's violent and dramatic history on the western frontier. Real life in the West was wilder than fiction, as these tales of the Santa Fe Trail and Las Vegas from 1835 to 1915 vividly demonstrate. The cast of characters is a large one, including Billy the Kid and Pat Garrett, "Doc" Holliday, "Mysterious Dave" Mather, Jesse James, Bod Ford, and the beautiful and mysterious gambling woman, Monte Verde. Historic photos and a lively text drawn from basic sources chronicle 80 years of dramatic events from the time of covered wagons to the arrival of airplanes.

FROM THE CRITICS

Scripps Howard News Service